After the War
by The Real Annabeth Chase
Summary: What'll happen? Runaways? Unexplained children? Who knows? Horrible summary; Great story!


**A/N: Okay, _really _long chapter. And if characters are a little OOC please tell me.**

I am currently in the Athena cabin getting ready for the 'The War Ended and We Won' celebration dance: My idea. The best part (besides me and Percy going together) is that Thalia and the hunters are here and Thalia is going to make an announcement.

I have made the worst choice by letting daughters of Aphrodite and Hermes choose my outfit... well actually the Aphrodite girl made it... The Hermes girl stole the supplies needed. Anyway thanks to them I am now wearing a sea-green figure-fitting dress that stops about an inch above my knees and is strapless. I understand that Kathy and Sheryl- the two girls -are excited that Percy and I are together, but really? The color of his eyes, really? Oh, well. I'm now starting too attempt to use a curling iron that Kathy lent to me, to seal in my natural curls.

As I finish curling I start to think about if I should sneak to the Aphrodite cabin, to have them do my make-up, or do it myself. Eh, I've bothered Kathy enough, I'll do it myself. I carefully put on some light blush and some pink lipstick. I quickly applied some silver eyeshadow and black mascara when I heard someone knock on the cabin door.

Knowing I'm the only one left in the cabin, and that my siblings mostly went by themselves, and didn't forget anything, I opened the bathroom door and entered the main part of the cabin. I slowly opened the front door to see Percy standing there in a pitch black tuxedo, looking almost as cute as he did when he first came to camp.

He placed his hand out towards me and I grabbed it. He pulled me put of me cabin, and I quietly closed the door. He slowly and carefully pulled my body into his and kissed me passionately. When we broke apart I wiped a little bit of my lipstick off the corners of his mouth and smiled, out of nowhere I hear an, "Aww."

I turn my head to see Nico. Smiling, while leaning against my cabin. I'm blushing, and I glance at Percy and he's blushing too.

"Don't worry you two. I just came, because Thalia wanted me to tell you the announcement before she made it: She's quitting the hunters."

I collapse in Percy's arms when I hear Nico. The boys help me back up and I get back my balance, "But... why?"

"You'll have to listen to the full announcement to find out," Was all he says before he shadow travels, to I guess the dining pavilion, which is where the dance was set up.

After me and Percy walk to the pavilion, Thaila greets us at the entrance and says, "Come on, I want you two too be closest to the stage when I say it."

I look at Percy and see him looking at me... I find that a bit awkward, so I turn my head forward and pull Percy along with me as I follow Thalia to the stage, and stop.

"Hi everyone," Thalia said into the microphone.

There are a few mumbled replies, and she continued, "I have an announcement: I am quitting the hunters."

I hear a few, "Why"s coming from somewhere behind me, and I guess Thalia hears them too because she replies, "Some of you may ask why. The most simple answer is, I fell in love." I hear the Aphrodite girls "Aww" and some Aphrodite guys pop their collars. I hear Thalia laugh inwardly and she then says, "With a certain boy who is _not_ a son of Aphrodite," then it was the Aphrodite boys turn to, "Aww."

That's when I notice Nico standing to the right side of the stage, smiling like Bianca had never really died, and he had just found out. That seems a little suspicious.

Thalia smiled one more time and said, "Thank you. That was all." And with that whichever Apollo camper that is currently working the controls with the music, turns on some fast-beat music. Thalia slowly, and sneakily walks off the stage, towards Nico. She uses the stairs that were used to exit off that side of the stage to get down, and Nico's arm was automatically slung around her. They start towards me and Percy, and I'm guessing that he's not noticing any of this because he's looking towards the place where I had some Hephaestus kids set up a dance floor. I nudge him and he looks down at me. I turn my head towards Thalia and Nico and he follows my gaze. Wow, I think I just _felt_ his jaw drop. Well, now I'm sure I did because once Thalia and Nico reach us she uses her hand to push it up again.

"Surprised much, Percy?" Nico asked in a mocking tone.

He doesn't even have enough sanity left to talk, so I answer for him, "I believe so."

Thalia waves a hand in his face and he seems to snap out of a trance.

"Huh? What?" is all he managed to say as he blinks.

"Are you surprised?" I ask.

"Well, duh, but then again, I might just be afraid that Athena's going to kill me, before I turn eighteen."

I slapped his arm and Thalia and Nico laughed.

All of a sudden I feel something tugging on my dress, I look behind me to see a little brunette girl that couldn't be older than six. I scrunch down a little bit so I can look at her.

"What cabin are you in, sweetie?" I ask her nicely.

"Nike," she answered me.

"Can you tell me what your doing?" I ask.

"An Aphodite gurl told me to come over 'ere and see who Talia's datin'" she tells me.

"Hmm," I say as I look behind her and a few yards away see an Aphrodite girl watching us with scared eyes. I look back to the little girl and tell her, "Well, tell the Aphrodite girl that Thalia's dating Nico."

The little girl smiles at me one more time and walks back over to the Aphrodite girl I had seen. In less then a minute the original Aphrodite girl squeezes into a group of her other siblings, and I turn back around to see Percy, Thalia, and Nico staring at me. "What?"

"You, just told her," is all Nico was able to say.

"She probably didn't even say it right," I told them.

Percy face-palms himself which makes me want to slap him and says, "You may be a daughter of Athena, but your being pretty stupid."

I obviously have a stupid look on my face because Thalia looks at me and says, "Annabeth, you just spread a rumor."

I roll my eyes and reply, "Really? I wasn't aware. And don't get mad at me, the Aphrodite girls would have figured it out either way."

All of a sudden I feel a slightly oversized hand on my shoulder and I turn around, to see Tyson. Yesterday Percy told me he'd be coming back to camp soon, I didn't expect it to be this soon.

"Hi Annabeth," he said.

I take a step back so that I can look at his face and say, "Hi Tyson. Didn't think you'd be back to camp this fast." Oh, yeah. Bet I sound smart.

After a few minutes of talking with Tyson and stuff like that he decided to go find some food. That's when me, Percy, Thalia, and Nico decided to sneak away. I figure that someone will notice that the person who set-up the prom isn't there, but right now I don't care. But right now Thalia and I have absolutely no clue where we're going because Nico's carrying her and Percy's carrying me, plus we're wearing bandanas over our eyes so we _really_ can't see.

"Guys," Thalia whined, obviously not liking this any more than me, "Why is this so secretive?"

"Because we want it to be a surprise," I can hear Nico say.

Not even two minutes later Percy says, "Okay, Annabeth, Thalia, you can take off your bandanas."

I take mine off and what I see takes my breath away: A small clearing that attaches the forest to the beach, there were numerous trees with hearts carved into them, a two small concrete benches, one by the shoreline and the other in the middle of the small clearing and the ocean would wash up around the shoreline.

Percy sets me down and Nico sets down Thalia. Percy grabbed my hand and brought me over to a tree that had a heart carved into it already. I don't know where it comes from but next thing I know, Percy has a screwdriver in his hand.

"I want you to guess what I'm going to do," he tells me.

After I guess a few times (And him laughing at every guess), he finally tells me, "I'm going to carve our names into the heart."

I look him in the eye and say, "Let me guess: In Greek. Then have me write it in English."

"Yep,"

He carves Ανναμπεθ Περσέας + into the tree then hands me the screwdriver. I carefully carve Annabeth + Perseus slightly smaller below it. Alas, it should be Annabeth + Percy, but Percy doesn't translate to Greek, and Perseus does.

Percy takes the screwdriver from me and places it next to the tree. He led me over to the bench that was by the shoreline and gestures for me to sit down. Once I do, he sits next to me, and we both watch the waves.

I take a chance to glance back to the other bench, and what I see doesn't surprise me: Nico and Thalia, mid-kiss. I sigh and face the shoreline again.

I look at Percy and lets just put it this way: For the second time tonight, our lips touched.

**A/N: Okay, okay. I know that this is in present tense. I want part of your comment to be weather to continue in present, or start in past.**

**YOU WILL PRESS THE LITTLE GREEN BUTTON! IF IT'S THE LAST THING YOU DO!**


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